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* Retired Senior Judge assigned to the Superior Court.

NON-PRECEDENTIAL DECISION - SEE SUPERIOR COURT I.O.P. 65.37

COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA

v.

LOVELETTE ATLAS COTTMAN 

Appellant

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 IN THE SUPERIOR COURT OF

 PENNSYLVANIA

 No. 2133 EDA 2017

Appeal from the Judgment of Sentence May 31, 2017

In the Court of Common Pleas of Delaware County Criminal Division at 

No(s): CP-23-CR-0003159-2015

BEFORE: DUBOW, J., MURRAY, J., and PLATT, J.*

MEMORANDUM BY DUBOW, J.: FILED SEPTEMBER 27, 2018

Lovelette Atlas Cottman (Appellant) appeals from his May 31, 2017 

Judgment of Sentence of three to six years’ imprisonment following his 

nonjury convictions for Possession with Intent to Deliver (PWID) and 

Possession of Drug Paraphernalia.1 Specifically, Appellant challenges the 

denial of his suppression motion. We affirm.

We glean the following factual and procedural history from the certified 

record. In connection with an ongoing narcotics investigation targeting 

Appellant as a possible distributor of PCP, law enforcement officers, including 

Officer William Carey of the City of Chester Police Department Narcotics Unit,

conducted a search pursuant to a warrant at Appellant’s home. During the 

search, the officers detected a strong odor of PCP and found an illegal weapon

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1 35 P.S. § 780-113(a)(30) and 35 P.S. § 780-113(a)(32), respectively.
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in the residence. Id. at 11. As a result, the Commonwealth issued an arrest 

warrant for Appellant. Id. at 11-12. 

On February 24, 2015, Officer Carey responded to a call for back up at 

the intersection of Ninth Street and Kerlin Street in Chester because a fellow 

officer had located Appellant sitting in a parked car near a gas station. Id. at 

10. The officers arrested Appellant without incident. While arresting 

Appellant, Officer Carey detected a strong odor of PCP emanating from the 

car. Id. at 12-13.2 

Officer Carey then conducted a warrantless search of the automobile at 

the scene during which he observed a small piece of a tissue hanging out of a 

crevice between the driver’s side floorboard and the center console. Id. at 

14-15. He pulled on the tissue which revealed a clear vial with a black lid and 

an eyedropper wrapped in more tissue paper. Id. at 15-16. The vial 

contained 61.6 grams of PCP. Id. at 17-18. 

As a result, the Commonwealth charged Appellant with, inter alia, the 

above offenses. 

Prior to trial, Appellant filed a motion to suppress the PCP, asserting that 

the police officers unlawfully searched his vehicle without a warrant. The court 

held a hearing on January 24, 2017. On March 7, 2017, the court denied 

Appellant’s motion, finding that the arresting officer had probable cause to 

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2 Officer Carey has ten years’ experience with the Chester Police Department,

four of them with the Narcotics Unit. He has come into contact with PCP 

numerous times, and is able to identify its unique odor because of his 

experience as an officer. N.T., 1/24/17, at 51-52.
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search the vehicle and the warrantless search was lawful under

Commonwealth v. Gary, 91 A.3d 102 (Pa. 2014). Trial Court Opinion, 

3/6/17, at 4-5. 

A trial court held a stipulated bench trial on April 26, 2017 and convicted 

Appellant of PWID and Possession of Drug Paraphernalia. On May 31, 2017, 

the court sentenced Appellant to an aggregate term of three to six years’ 

incarceration followed by 11 years’ probation. 

Appellant timely filed a notice of appeal. Appellant presents the 

following question for this Court's consideration:

Whether the trial court erred in failing to grant suppression of the 

drugs found in the vehicle in question since the search of the 

vehicle required the issuance of a warrant in order to be legal[?]

Appellant’s Brief at 7.

This Court's well-settled standard of review of a denial of a motion to 

suppress evidence is as follows:

An appellate court’s standard of review in addressing a challenge 

to the denial of a suppression motion is limited to determining 

whether the suppression court’s factual findings are supported by 

the record and whether the legal conclusions drawn from those 

facts are correct. Because the Commonwealth prevailed before 

the suppression court, we may consider only the evidence of the 

Commonwealth and so much of the evidence for the defense as 

remains uncontradicted when read in the context of the record as 

a whole. Where the suppression court’s factual findings are 

supported by the record, the appellate court is bound by those

findings and may reverse only if the court's legal conclusions are 

erroneous. Where ... the appeal of the determination of the 

suppression court turns on allegations of legal error, the 

suppression court’s legal conclusions are not binding on an 

appellate court, whose duty it is to determine if the suppression 
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court properly applied the law to the facts. Thus, the conclusions 

of law of the courts below are subject to plenary review.

Commonwealth v. Jones, 121 A.3d 524, 526-27 (Pa. Super. 2015) (citation 

omitted).

With respect to a warrantless search of a vehicle, Pennsylvania’s law is 

“coextensive” with federal law under the Fourth Amendment of the U.S. 

Constitution. Gary, 91 A.3d 102, 120 (Pa. 2014) (OAJC). In Gary, a plurality 

of our Supreme Court held that “[t]he prerequisite for a warrantless search of 

a motor vehicle is probable cause to search; no exigency beyond the inherent 

mobility of a motor vehicle is required.” Id. at 138. Thus, we must determine

whether the officers had probable cause to search Appellant’s vehicle.

Probable cause exists where the facts and circumstances within the 

officer's knowledge are sufficient to warrant a person of reasonable caution to 

believe that a defendant has or is committing an offense. Commonwealth 

v. Runyan, 160 A.3d 831, 837 (Pa. Super. 2017) (citation omitted). “The 

evidence required to establish probable cause for a warrantless search must 

be more than a mere suspicion or a good faith belief on the part of the police 

officer.” Id. The well-established standard for evaluating whether probable 

cause exists is consideration of the “totality of the circumstances.” Id. 

Appellant challenges the validity of the vehicle search following his 

arrest. Under the totality of the circumstances, we conclude the police officers 

had probable cause to search the vehicle without a warrant. 
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 When police officers arrested Appellant, Officer Carey, an experienced 

narcotics officer who had obtained the arrest warrant based on the odor of 

PCP in Appellant’s home, detected the same unique odor of PCP emanating 

from the vehicle. Under the totality of these circumstances, we conclude that 

the trial court had sufficient basis to conclude that the officers had probable 

cause to believe that Appellant had committed an offense. Pursuant to Gary

and Runyan, the warrantless search of the vehicle was proper.

Appellant’s argument that the Appellant did not own or lease the vehicle 

does not alter our analysis under Gary and Runyan. It was the odor of PCP 

that provided the police officer with a sufficient basis to find probable cause. 

The fact that Appellant did not own or lease the vehicle is irrelevant to the 

probable cause analysis. 

Accordingly, we conclude that the suppression court properly denied 

Appellant’s motion to suppress the drugs found in the vehicle. We, thus, 

affirm the judgment of sentence. 

Judgment of sentence affirmed. 

Judgment Entered.

Joseph D. Seletyn, Esq.

Prothonotary

Date: 9/27/18